Brunswick, Pt. 17, Bar Harbor

Well, today was mostly a good day.  I was feeling better, but still did not have much of an appetite.  We got up early today to go to Bar Harbor (or, you know.... Bah Habah).  Bar Harbor is about 3 hours northeast of Brunswick.  I have never been more north in Maine than Augusta, so it was nice to see Bangor along the way.  What wasn't nice was me getting slapped with a $137.00 speeding ticket!  Gah.  I even had cruise control set!  Obviously, it was too much.  I hear about women being given warnings all the time, but men don't get let off so easy.  I bought the shirt below to commemorate the sucky experience.  

My speed was not as bad as this!

Anyway, after my visit with the police, we arrived in Bangor and ate at a place that not only claimed to have "The Best Lobster Roll" (they all say that), but also the biggest.  I didn't get one because my stomach was saying no, but Chelsea and Wendy did.  They were pretty big, but I think Red's still takes the prize.  Then, Chelsea and Wendy wanted to be creepy stalkers, so we drove up the road to Stephen King's house so they could take pictures.  I waited in the car :-)  I mean, if it was Tom Brady, sure, I could go into stalker mode.  Stephen King is an author who was born in Maine and Wendy absolutely *loves* his writing.  I haven't read any of his books, but they do sound very good from what Wendy has told me.  

Wendy outside Stephen King's house (Bangor, ME)

Ok, so stalking is done (for the moment... I made a note to look up where Tom Brady lives in Boston), and we headed to Fort Knox.  This fort was huge compared to the last one we went to.  And to get to the fort we had to drive across a very interesting bridge.  It was kinda freaky, but I do OK with bridges.  People say this fort is haunted.  Apparently, people have seen ghost like figures of soldiers from the civil war and have heard footsteps when they were alone.  One of the ghost hunting TV shows even did an episode on the place.  I dunno... I didn't experience any thrill like that, but maybe I'll have to go back at night. 

Wendy's note:

Note the creepy suspension bridge is only connected to the road down the middle.  I felt like either side could just fall off! (Can you tell I have a bit of a bridge phobia?)  Those windows at the very top of the tower were an actual thing you could go to, but Chelsea said no thank you.  She has a bridge phobia as well as a heights phobia. :-)

I stole one of these from the internet because we didn't want to spend the time or money on the biplane tours (yes, they had them) to get the aerial shot.  Pretty impressive structure, though.

Beautiful views, too!

This is one of the creepy haunted hallways. It was actually darker in person. My camera used flash to get this. FYI - stone building eat light from flashlights, etc.

Joel getting his cannon on. I dared him to pick up one of those cannon balls but they were all welded together. I guess lifting that might have been a bit much, even for a guy who works out.

Our next destination was Bar Harbor.  Before getting to the harbor, we took a drive around Acacia National Park.  Oh my goodness, that place is beautiful.  I can't even imagine what it looks like in the fall!  We drove to the top of the mountain in the park and the views were spectacular.  The top of the mountain is also the first place in the United States to see the sunrise!  I'm not that ambitious.... 

Wendy's note:

The little one above was kind enough to stand very still by the side of the road while I took pictures as we drove through Acadia.  Below on the left I took a picture of Joel as we walked out to where that person in the distance is standing, then another once we got there.  The ocean was very blue this day, and it was just gorgeous weather!

I wish it was possible to capture in pictures how quiet, beautiful, and breathtaking it was on top of Cadillac Mountain.  These will have to do.

Finally, we got to Bar Harbor.  It is very similar to Boothbay, but it was more bustling.  This was in part because of the beautiful day we had today.  There was a cruise ship just off the shore and everyone from the ship had come into the town and was doing some shopping.  We did lots of shopping ourselves (this is where I bought the "life is crap" shirt).

Well, today was the last day we could have seen a moose.  Again, the signs on the side of the road said "DANGER!!! MOOSE CROSSING!!!".  But again, they lied.  We never saw a moose.  Not on the way there, not on the way back.  

Wendy's note: 

We did, however see this.  And that's something you don't see every day in Tucson.